7 ms·

We apply very draconian rules to motorists, and then people get upset when those same kind of rules are not applied to other users. It is very inconsistent and

by 7952 8y ago

We apply very draconian rules to motorists, and then people get upset when those same kind of rules are not applied to other users. It is very inconsistent and that makes people angry. But this ignores the fact that motor vehicles are exceptional in terms of the harm they can cause simply due to weight and speed. That is why we need draconian and annoying laws, but only for motor vehicles. The risk posed by bikes and pedestrians is so small that strictly enforced rules would be authoritarian and restrict freedom to an unacceptable degree. I do agree that cyclists should follow rules. But the magnitutde of danger caused by rule breaking is massively lower and that should be acknowledged. A dangerous driver is committing a worse crime than a careless cyclist. Also, cyclists are not some homogeneous group. The person complaining about dangerous drivers is not neccessarily the person going through a red light.

zaarn 8y ago
Why do Cyclists get to be special? Where I live, the same rules apply for cyclists as for drivers up to loosing your drivers license for biking drunk (including biking ban). A bike can do a lot of damage and harm once it goes beyond walking speed and even at walking speed it can be quite dangerous. I get that not every cyclists runs the red lights but those that do are a clear danger to traffic safety.
- 7952 8y ago
  You could also have a rule that bans drunk pedestrians. Because they could cause an accident by making a car swerve. They are also more dangerous in terms of committing other crimes. The difference is that pedestrians and cyclists don't weigh several tonnes and are able to move at very high speeds. I am not suggesting that bad behaviour should be legal. Merely that it is not morally comparable to dangerous driving.
  - maxerickson 8y ago
    Lots of places do have laws that ban people from being intoxicated in public. They often aren't severe, more so police are able to remove extremely intoxicated people from a public location.
  - zaarn 8y ago
    That is also somewhat the case. If someone is sufficiently drunk walking about instead of getting a safer ride home, they may receive a temporary driving ban (I haven't heard of anything longer than a week in that case) and if you endanger traffic then you can loose your drivers license. The difference is that pedestrian and cyclists don't weigh tons but can still severely endanger others and themselves.
    - lmm 8y ago
      > If someone is sufficiently drunk walking about instead of getting a safer ride home, they may receive a temporary driving ban (I haven't heard of anything longer than a week in that case) Why a driving ban rather than a walking ban? Doesn't the same logic suggest giving cyclists a driving ban rather than a cycling ban?
      - zaarn 8y ago
        A driving ban because if you endanger traffic while drunk then how can we trust you not to endanger traffic while drunk when you're allowed to drive a car? You don't get a cyclist ban, to my knowledge, since it isn't licensed. This is mostly about deriving how responsible you are with a car from how responsible you behave in traffic when you're not a car.
- RandomInteger4 8y ago
  A car is not a bike. Whatever happened to the concept of context?
  - zaarn 8y ago
    If you flatten a pedestrian I doubt they care whether it was with a car or a bike. And the court won't care much if you were drunk. The road is supposed to be used responsibly, driving or cycling drunk shows you don't care about that. Everyone here uses Taxi, public transport or friends for transport if drunk.
    - lmm 8y ago
      > If you flatten a pedestrian I doubt they care whether it was with a car or a bike. The pedestrian absolutely notices whether they were hit by a tonne of metal going 40mph or 20kg going at 20mph. Regulation should be proportionate to how much risk you impose on others. Given how many more people get killed by car drivers than by cyclists, we should be looking to make driving tests much stricter before we even begin to worry about regulating cycling.
      - zaarn 8y ago
        Of course the risk is taken into account but in the end, if you hurt someone while driving or cycling drunk, you have thoroughly demonstrated your lack of understanding of traffic rules and shouldn't handle a car.
foldr 8y ago
> The risk posed by bikes and pedestrians is so small that strictly enforced rules would be authoritarian and restrict freedom to an unacceptable degree. Rubbish. Having cyclists stop at red lights when people are crossing the road does not restrict their freedom "to an unacceptable degree". And even though I'm not likely to be killed by a cyclist running into me, I'd still much rather that they didn't. I say this as someone who doesn't have a driving license, so I'm not "pro car". I'm just anti getting whomped out of nowhere by a bike.
- gargravarr 8y ago
  I thoroughly agree. I live in Oxford, UK, well known for being bike-friendly, and it's incredibly rare that cyclists stop at lights here. It's a historic city with narrow streets and restricted visibility in some places. More than once I've gone to pull away from lights and a cyclist has zoomed through a red, forcing me to swerve. I've also encountered the 3-abreast thing and it's infuriating as a driver. Many ignore the fact there's a car behind them and force me to overtake dangerously rather than going to single-file. Now don't get me wrong, it's frustrating, but I'm also a cyclist. I appreciate Oxford's bike-friendliness. I cycle more than I drive. In fact, I've encountered more of the 3-abreast problem when I'm riding - groups having a chat at a slow speed while I'm trying to get to work. I stop at lights for my own safety while others completely ignore them. I never ride without a helmet. And when I'm on the road, I try to keep as close to the kerb as I can without hitting drains. It's frustrating, for sure, but the internet breeds hatred from frustration. There's a nice little graphic showing it as a distillation process. Facebook is phenomenally bad at this, by design, since it groups and sorts these kinds of people together. This DFROC group has one advantage though - it could be turned into a private group and then this pool of cess would never need to leak out to the rest of the internet. So long as it stays there, this hatred can continue to fester without hurting anyone, but as we know by now, it always leaks back into real life. The minority may give the majority a bad name, but the boiling hatred from these echo chambers eventually convinces somebody that their feelings are justified and go do something they will regret. The internet is not a healthy place, but it does have its distant basis in facts.
  - 7952 8y ago
chrisseaton 8y ago
> The risk posed by bikes and pedestrians is so small I don't know... cars stay on the road where I live. Cyclists will happily ride on the pavement and justify it with 'the road's too dangerous to cycle on'. They seem to consciously be happy with endangering people more vulnerable than themselves in order to keep themselves safe... which is what they criticise car drivers with. I'm more concerned in practice about my three-year old daughter being hit by a cyclist on the pavement, than by a car on the road.
- belorn 8y ago
  As a daily cyclist I commonly see parents with strollers on the bike road. For my bike road to work there is a down slope followed by a sharp turn, and there the city planners have made a temporary combined bike road and pavement for the last couple of years during construction. It is very common to see strollers during there, people in wheelchairs or groups of small children. The city seems happy with endangering people. Parents seems happy with endangering babies there. No one has ever been charged with endangering of children, and I have never seen anyone stopping a parent with a stroller and telling them that they are endangering their child by walking on a bike road. If anything I also see an increase of strollers during the time when the road is full of ice. The order in which the city clear out snow and ice is roads > bike roads > pavement, and parents with strollers do not want to walk in snow. Given the alternative most seems to pick the bike road. Other fun participants I have seen on exclusive bike roads is 4-5 year olds learning to bike with training wheels. Just like with strollers I always give them a bit extra distance when passing them, which might explain why there has been zero deaths or injuries from bike hitting strollers or young children even through those are common sights on bike roads. If one wonder the cause of that I think one just need to check the average speed of bikes in a city and the reaction and braking speed. I am sure if a parent would take a stroller and walk on the road against car traffic then social service would have a very strong opinion about it. That would actually be unsafe behavior and traffic records support in every way that bikes are safe and cars are not. Being more concerned about a three-year old being hit by a cyclist on the pavement than by a car on the road is flying against statistics, and I would say actual behavior. Would you honestly say that your reaction to a parent walking with a stroller on a bike road would be identical to a parent walking with a stroller against car traffic on the road?

by 7952 8y ago

zaarn 8y ago

Why do Cyclists get to be special? Where I live, the same rules apply for cyclists as for drivers up to loosing your drivers license for biking drunk (including biking ban). A bike can do a lot of damage and harm once it goes beyond walking speed and even at walking speed it can be quite dangerous. I get that not every cyclists runs the red lights but those that do are a clear danger to traffic safety.

7952 8y ago
You could also have a rule that bans drunk pedestrians. Because they could cause an accident by making a car swerve. They are also more dangerous in terms of committing other crimes. The difference is that pedestrians and cyclists don't weigh several tonnes and are able to move at very high speeds. I am not suggesting that bad behaviour should be legal. Merely that it is not morally comparable to dangerous driving.
- maxerickson 8y ago
  Lots of places do have laws that ban people from being intoxicated in public. They often aren't severe, more so police are able to remove extremely intoxicated people from a public location.
- zaarn 8y ago
  That is also somewhat the case. If someone is sufficiently drunk walking about instead of getting a safer ride home, they may receive a temporary driving ban (I haven't heard of anything longer than a week in that case) and if you endanger traffic then you can loose your drivers license. The difference is that pedestrian and cyclists don't weigh tons but can still severely endanger others and themselves.
  - lmm 8y ago
    > If someone is sufficiently drunk walking about instead of getting a safer ride home, they may receive a temporary driving ban (I haven't heard of anything longer than a week in that case) Why a driving ban rather than a walking ban? Doesn't the same logic suggest giving cyclists a driving ban rather than a cycling ban?
    - zaarn 8y ago
      A driving ban because if you endanger traffic while drunk then how can we trust you not to endanger traffic while drunk when you're allowed to drive a car? You don't get a cyclist ban, to my knowledge, since it isn't licensed. This is mostly about deriving how responsible you are with a car from how responsible you behave in traffic when you're not a car.
RandomInteger4 8y ago
A car is not a bike. Whatever happened to the concept of context?
- zaarn 8y ago
  If you flatten a pedestrian I doubt they care whether it was with a car or a bike. And the court won't care much if you were drunk. The road is supposed to be used responsibly, driving or cycling drunk shows you don't care about that. Everyone here uses Taxi, public transport or friends for transport if drunk.
  - lmm 8y ago
    > If you flatten a pedestrian I doubt they care whether it was with a car or a bike. The pedestrian absolutely notices whether they were hit by a tonne of metal going 40mph or 20kg going at 20mph. Regulation should be proportionate to how much risk you impose on others. Given how many more people get killed by car drivers than by cyclists, we should be looking to make driving tests much stricter before we even begin to worry about regulating cycling.
    - zaarn 8y ago
      Of course the risk is taken into account but in the end, if you hurt someone while driving or cycling drunk, you have thoroughly demonstrated your lack of understanding of traffic rules and shouldn't handle a car.

foldr 8y ago

> The risk posed by bikes and pedestrians is so small that strictly enforced rules would be authoritarian and restrict freedom to an unacceptable degree. Rubbish. Having cyclists stop at red lights when people are crossing the road does not restrict their freedom "to an unacceptable degree". And even though I'm not likely to be killed by a cyclist running into me, I'd still much rather that they didn't. I say this as someone who doesn't have a driving license, so I'm not "pro car". I'm just anti getting whomped out of nowhere by a bike.

gargravarr 8y ago
I thoroughly agree. I live in Oxford, UK, well known for being bike-friendly, and it's incredibly rare that cyclists stop at lights here. It's a historic city with narrow streets and restricted visibility in some places. More than once I've gone to pull away from lights and a cyclist has zoomed through a red, forcing me to swerve. I've also encountered the 3-abreast thing and it's infuriating as a driver. Many ignore the fact there's a car behind them and force me to overtake dangerously rather than going to single-file. Now don't get me wrong, it's frustrating, but I'm also a cyclist. I appreciate Oxford's bike-friendliness. I cycle more than I drive. In fact, I've encountered more of the 3-abreast problem when I'm riding - groups having a chat at a slow speed while I'm trying to get to work. I stop at lights for my own safety while others completely ignore them. I never ride without a helmet. And when I'm on the road, I try to keep as close to the kerb as I can without hitting drains. It's frustrating, for sure, but the internet breeds hatred from frustration. There's a nice little graphic showing it as a distillation process. Facebook is phenomenally bad at this, by design, since it groups and sorts these kinds of people together. This DFROC group has one advantage though - it could be turned into a private group and then this pool of cess would never need to leak out to the rest of the internet. So long as it stays there, this hatred can continue to fester without hurting anyone, but as we know by now, it always leaks back into real life. The minority may give the majority a bad name, but the boiling hatred from these echo chambers eventually convinces somebody that their feelings are justified and go do something they will regret. The internet is not a healthy place, but it does have its distant basis in facts.
- 7952 8y ago

chrisseaton 8y ago

> The risk posed by bikes and pedestrians is so small I don't know... cars stay on the road where I live. Cyclists will happily ride on the pavement and justify it with 'the road's too dangerous to cycle on'. They seem to consciously be happy with endangering people more vulnerable than themselves in order to keep themselves safe... which is what they criticise car drivers with. I'm more concerned in practice about my three-year old daughter being hit by a cyclist on the pavement, than by a car on the road.

belorn 8y ago
As a daily cyclist I commonly see parents with strollers on the bike road. For my bike road to work there is a down slope followed by a sharp turn, and there the city planners have made a temporary combined bike road and pavement for the last couple of years during construction. It is very common to see strollers during there, people in wheelchairs or groups of small children. The city seems happy with endangering people. Parents seems happy with endangering babies there. No one has ever been charged with endangering of children, and I have never seen anyone stopping a parent with a stroller and telling them that they are endangering their child by walking on a bike road. If anything I also see an increase of strollers during the time when the road is full of ice. The order in which the city clear out snow and ice is roads > bike roads > pavement, and parents with strollers do not want to walk in snow. Given the alternative most seems to pick the bike road. Other fun participants I have seen on exclusive bike roads is 4-5 year olds learning to bike with training wheels. Just like with strollers I always give them a bit extra distance when passing them, which might explain why there has been zero deaths or injuries from bike hitting strollers or young children even through those are common sights on bike roads. If one wonder the cause of that I think one just need to check the average speed of bikes in a city and the reaction and braking speed. I am sure if a parent would take a stroller and walk on the road against car traffic then social service would have a very strong opinion about it. That would actually be unsafe behavior and traffic records support in every way that bikes are safe and cars are not. Being more concerned about a three-year old being hit by a cyclist on the pavement than by a car on the road is flying against statistics, and I would say actual behavior. Would you honestly say that your reaction to a parent walking with a stroller on a bike road would be identical to a parent walking with a stroller against car traffic on the road?